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If you find yourself working far more hours than you did when you worked for someone else, it may be time to hire an assistant.

This work overload is to be expected while you are growing your business, but at some point you expect the work load to lessen so that you can take some time for yourself, and more importantly, concentrate on growing your business. If you find yourself overwhelmed with many different tasks, need some business support, and meet yourself coming into work as you are leaving the office from the night before, it may be time to hire an assistant.

You might consider hiring a virtual assistant if you’re a solopreneur or work out of your home, . A virtual assistant, or VA, is also an entrepreneur operating her own business. The role of her business is to help solopreneurs like you operate your business and provide business support. They work from their own home or other location so you do not need to provide them with an office or other equipment. And, they are not your employee, which saves you a lot of paperwork and money.

A VA is a skilled professional who provides her clients with administrative support. Some of the services offered by a virtual assistant can be very specific depending on their skill set.  A VA can provide services that range in complexity from answering email to designing web sites to social media management. The beauty of virtual assistants is that you can use them on an on-call basis, and you only pay for the time you use their services.

Here are 7 signs that you tell you it is time to hire an assistant:

1. Email overload.  Does it take you an hour or more to sift through all of your email? . A virtual assistant is great for handling email.  She can delete spam, respond to emails that do not need your attention, and flag the emails that you need to answer.

2. Web site updates. You have written several pieces of content for your web site, but you have not found the time to post the articles to your site. Your VA can post your articles, and if your VA is skilled in Internet marketing, can help you build a marketing campaign using your articles.

3. Lost opportunity costs. If your hourly rate is $225/hour, and you spend 3 hours updating your web site, you just cost yourself $675.  Instead, you could have had your virtual assistant complete this task at a cost of $60/hour, for a cost of $180.  Moreover, she probably would have completed this task in half the time that it took you to do so ($90), and saved you 3 hours of your time where you could have been seeking out or fulfilling other opportunities in which you bill $225/hour.

4. Social media management. Are you creating a strong presence on all of the different social media sites and interacting with your fans and followers? Today’s businesses must have a marketing strategy that includes social media sites. If you cannot keep up with all of the changes happening in social media, hire a VA that has the expertise to build a following for your company, post new information to the sites on your behalf, and improve your presence on one or more social media web sites.

5. Crispy Critter Syndrome. When you find yourself burned out and losing touch with your family and friends, hire a virtual assistant. You can only work 18 hours a day 7 days a week for so long before you’re ready to throw in the towel. Hiring a virtual assistant an cut down the time you spend working. This can give you a much needed break, which allows you to reconnect with family and friends, and recharge and rejuvenate.

6. Stagnate business growth. Is your business not performing as expected because you cannot keep up with all of the demands? Let a VA help you stay connected to your customers, handle your customer service, and help you keep your company growing. A VA can send out cards to your customers for various occasions, make phone calls, and even help sell your products and services.

7. Task avoidance. There are things in your business that you hate doing, and avoid them at all costs.  Even though you might dread this tasks, you can delegate these to your assistant who will get them done for you.  No longer will important business slip through the cracks.

Isn’t it time to make running your business less stressful and more profitable? If you find yourself in any of the above-mentioned situations, consider hiring an assistant to make your life easier.

Confused about how to hire a VA for your business?  Check out my new video series here on How to Hire a VA.

About the Author: Donna Gunter

I’m an Internet marketing coach and local marketing consultant who teaches small business owners how to stop the client chase and turn web site clicks into customers. I welcome guest posts.

http://www.clientattraction.com/2012/05/hire-a-va-so-you-can-generate-more-income.php

Marketing Guru Donna Gunter (http://www.getmoreclientsonline.com/) says:

Yep, that’s right. Facebook has new rules for the cover image of business pages. No pricing information, no discount/promo information, no website address, no contact info (including email/phone), no attempts to encourage them to like your page………

What’s the rationale?  Facebook provides you with pages free of charge, and if you want to promote/advertise they want you to buy their programs. i.e. ads.

Here are some more articles that should help you navigate the changes….

• Social Media Examiner outlines the major changes  here.
• John Jantsch discusses how to best optimize your Facebook page from a marketing perspective  here.
• Here’s a great post from Hubspot on how to update your business page  here.
• Here’s a great post on creative ways to create your timeline profile pic from Ching Ya  here.
• Denise Wakeman has posted some graphic design resources for creating your timeline profile image  here.
• Amy Porterfield just did a teleclass on the changes, which you can access  here

You can also have a thumbnail image but not the badge or banner on the left side of your page.  You might want to place an image of yourself or something that brands your business here.

Let me know if you have any questions about all this and I’m happy to help.

She’s done the research on blog/social media commenting tribes/circles and those who have chosen to participate have reported great increases in their traffic and activity on their blogs.

Here is a link to her blog post and more information on “how-to”.  It’s 5 easy steps!

http://www.getmoreclientsonline.com/blog-comments-steps-creating-group/

Let me know your comments and let’s get started on this!  Let me know how I can help.

http://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20120206005521/en/Laptop-Travel-Frontier-Airlines-Launches-Onboard-Wi-Fi

==> I’m now offering a new service, Automated Authority Marketing, to a select group of business owners. In a nutshell, what you receive is 4 keyword-rich articles that my team writes for you that are then posted on your blog, syndicated in article directories, as podcasts, as documents, as video and mentioned on social bookmarking sites. What’s the criteria to work with me? Your primary web site must be a WordPress blog site, and you must have a finely defined target market. The cost? $797 for setup and then $497/month. Want to see if you’re a good fit? Schedule an appointment here.

• Hosting your video on YouTube?  There’s a FireFox extension called “Easy YouTube Video downloader” that converts the video to audio.
• Got iTunes?  Import your video and let iTunes convert to audio easily.
• Do you own Camtasia?  Import the video and strip out the audio.

Give it try and start offering the audio version of your videos to prospects, media, customers, etc!